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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/24591430">detriment</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/pissedofsandwich/pseuds/pissedofsandwich'>pissedofsandwich</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Bumilangit Cinematic Universe, Gundala (2019)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Dysfunctional Relationships, Explicit Language, F/F, Mild description of torture, Non-Linear Narrative, liberal interpretation of characters from a handful of comics and movies</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-06-07</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-06-07</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-04 06:35:01</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>4,625</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/24591430</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/pissedofsandwich/pseuds/pissedofsandwich</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>“I can’t imagine what else you might want.”</p><p>“Really,” Cantika raises her eyebrows. It’s unfair how hot it makes Nani feel. “You can’t?”</p><p>“Really,” Nani says, but her throat feels dry. </p><p>Cantika hums again. Devastatingly, she looks away. “Then maybe I’m not as smooth as I think I am.”</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Nani/Cantika</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>4</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>4</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>detriment</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>(1)</strong>
</p><p>A year after Pengkor’s fall, the city is in chaos again. Nani’s beginning to think that there’s no use to having Patriots in the city. Though the circumstances have changed, it’s unnerving to realize that she’s in the same spot again: perched on top of a roof of an abandoned warehouse as she lets her <em>sumping </em>do its work.</p><p>It’s a trafficking ring that she’s after. Some of the drivers that Awang works with have been talking about a big drop-off, somewhere in the bay. It may be nothing, but it’s worth checking out; worst case scenario is she finds other crimes. Either way, she defeats bad guys—who knows, some of them may even know a guy who knows a guy.</p><p>She’s alone tonight, not entirely by choice. There’s a fire in Tanah Abang, big enough to swallow the whole complex, and most of the Patriots are there, helping civilians and firefighters with their gifts. Godam and Tira were with her, until Tira received an alert from one of her finnicky high-tech gadgets—they had it under control, last time she checked on Twitter. Live updates coming from the scene report no human casualties, and there are enough hands helping the victims between Godam, Tira, and a patrolling Gundala. Sri Asih is left on the docks to oversee possible activities from the ring—one of her is enough to take them all down, anyway.</p><p>It’s all a rational decision, really; since starting the Patriots, Nani’s learned one or two valuable lessons about delegating. Still, Nani’s not alone by entirely selfless reasons—she’s hoping to finally catch the trafficking ring red-handed, because it’s usually when <em>she </em>shows up.</p><p>After Pengkor’s death, all his children are scattered to the winds. Most choose to live in hiding, fearing prosecution for being accessory to Pengkor’s crimes, but some stay in the city, atoning for the chaos their father inflicted on the city by fighting crime. One of them being <em>her—</em>the short-haired, conservatively-dressed Cantika, who forever will be an enigma to Nani.</p><p>Sancaka rejects the idea of working alongside the orphans. He thinks they’re too volatile, too many wild-cards. Most of the Patriots echo his reasoning. Tira’s the only one who’s willing to entertain the idea, but only because their method of executing crime-fighting is more or less the same as her: if they shoot at you, you shoot them with twice the amount of bullets. It’s something that the Patriots actively discourage; public opinion of them is detrimental to their operations, as they are operating outside the law. The only thing stopping nay-sayers from arresting them is the public, so the Patriots need to nurture that perception.</p><p>A movement out of the corner of her eyes catches her attention. The <em>sumping </em>doesn’t go haywire, the way they usually do when in close proximity with danger, which is how Nani knows that it’s her. She doesn’t turn around, lets Cantika approach her. She’s not a scared deer in this situation, and Cantika’s far less than a tiger.</p><p>“I have no idea why you’re still here.”</p><p>That has Nani turning around. “Aren’t you here, too?”</p><p>“Only after I double-checked,” Cantika says. “Trail’s gone cold. There’s no drop off happening today.”</p><p>“What?” Nani feels her shoulders slump. “How did you know?”</p><p>“I know people.”</p><p>“Right.”</p><p>Cantika goes to stand in a respectable distance away from her. “Don’t you want to know their names?” she asks—taunts, really. Being deep in Pengkor’s circle means that even after Pengkor’s demise, her name still holds weight the underground world. No matter how thorough Wulan’s investigation or Tira’s intimidation tactics are, when it comes to connections, they’re more often than not a mile off.</p><p>Nani tells the Patriots this is why they need to work together with the orphans.</p><p>The truth is a little less frivolous.</p><p>“Does it matter if I ask?” Nani says. “You wouldn’t tell me.”</p><p>Cantika hums into the cold wind. If Nani focuses hard enough, her <em>sumping </em>could pick up the waves crashing into the shore, breaking into sharp water. She can pretend they’re sitting by the sea, two girls inconspicuously enjoying each other’s presence, talking about things that have nothing to do with organized crime.</p><p>Nani thinks about the first time she met her.</p><p>“For the right price, maybe.”</p><p>That snaps her out of her reverie. She turns to face the other girl. As expected, Cantika’s not looking at her. She has a habit of treating you with only a modicum sense of respect when you don’t interest her enough. Nani has been trying to get her to look her in the eyes for months.</p><p>“Whatever information that we manage to extract, you know that already,” Nani tells her. It’s true—no one knows a murder of crows better than their own kind, after all. Nani <em>really </em>thinks that the Patriots should work with Cantika.</p><p>“Did I say I want information?”</p><p>Nani pauses. “I can’t imagine what else you might want.”</p><p>And then—and <em>then</em>, ever so slightly, Cantika turns. Slow, like she knows Nani will savor it. The shadows cover most of her face, but it’s clear as day to Nani that Cantika’s <em>smiling</em>. Deliberate, small, <em>teasing</em>. It makes Nani want to bridge the offending gap between them.</p><p>“Really,” Cantika raises her eyebrows. It’s unfair how hot it makes Nani feel. “You can’t?”</p><p>“Really,” Nani says, but her throat feels dry.</p><p>Cantika hums again. Devastatingly, she looks away. “Then maybe I’m not as smooth as I think I am.”</p><p>
  <strong>(12)</strong>
</p><p>The Patriots headquarters—Djakarta Times warehouse turned into one—are quiet when Nani comes back, way later than she intended. Funnily enough, no one commed her when she thought she would’ve at least been chewed out by Godam.</p><p>She should’ve, then, expected to see Awang, turning around perfectly in the new swiveling chair that took Sancaka three hours to assemble, poised with his legs crossed, fingers sewn together atop of his knees. He looks equal parts smug and relieved.</p><p>“How nice of you to finally come home, Sri Asih,” Awang says, and it only sounds like it’s been rehearsed maybe three hundred times.</p><p>Nani rolls her eyes. Her <em>selendang </em>retracts into a sheath around her wrists, the knife held close in the folds of the red fabric. “How many times did you get it wrong?”</p><p>“Twice,” Awang answers proudly. “The first time, it was just Teddy looking for the text books he left on your desk. The second time, I nearly gave Pak Agung a heart attack.”</p><p>“Ha ha,” Nani says, without feeling.</p><p>Awang grins, shit-eatingly. “I startled you, didn’t I? That’s all I want, really—to catch the great Sri Asih by surprise.”</p><p>“What do you want, Awang?” Nani sighs.</p><p>“An explanation would be great, perhaps,” Awang starts. His tone is light, teasing—but Nani knows an edge when she sees it. This is not Awang just being a little shit, she realizes. This is the team staging an intervention, with Awang as the executioner.</p><p>Shit. She knew she was foolish to think that she’d been hiding it well.</p><p>“I stayed out to check that intel Wulan gave me,” Nani lies.</p><p>“Which one?”</p><p>“The one about Riani?”</p><p>“She said her band had a show tonight in Kemang. So I checked her out.”</p><p>“In full Sri Asih get-up?”</p><p>“No, I ran into some thugs on the way home.”</p><p>“Hm,” Awang says thoughtfully. “Then why do you have a hickey?”</p><p>It’s moments like these that has Nani vehemently reminding herself that she, Nani Wijaya, has been named Indonesia’s most influential woman in three consecutive years. CEO of a biotechnology company making waves in Western medicine and global food security. Literal goddess incarnate.</p><p>As such, she doesn’t do things like blush and splutter.</p><p>No, she does <em>not</em>.</p><p>“Mind your own business,” she scowls, and hopes that the redness in her face is not visible in the dim light.</p><p>“I will!” Awang chirps happily, following Nani to her desk, the air of casualty all around him with his hands inside his pocket. Once he’s in Nani’s line of view, the smile drops, and his gaze turns serious. “If the business isn’t our leader fraternizing with the enemy.”</p><p>“She’s not an enemy.”</p><p>“Oh, so it <em>is </em>her.”</p><p>“Are you questioning my authority?” Nani asks, her chin high. “You can call a counsel to hash this out, you know. This is a democracy, after all.”</p><p>“Sure, but it’s fun to ambush you like this,” Awang grins.</p><p>“Fuck <em>off.</em>”</p><p>“Look, I get <em>it</em>,” Awang says. “Girls like bad boys. Well, bad <em>girls</em>. It’s why they’re making a Milea movie even though the first one totally wrapped up their story. It’s the thrill, right? How can something so good be so wrong?” he clutches his chest dramatically. Nani swats him away. “And I dig it, really. The Romeo and Juliet of it all—forbidden romance! Two opposing sides <em>coming </em>together!”</p><p>“Don’t—”</p><p>“I’m not making a joke about <em>that, </em>Nani Wijaya. Sheesh, I respect the lesbians too much,” Awang cuts her off, which, in retrospect, proves her point more than anything. “But like, you know. Romeo and Juliet both die in the end.” He gasps, clearly enjoying the show he’s making. “I <em>know</em>. Why would people reference Romeo and Juliet so much if it’s a tragedy? I just found out this morning, too.”</p><p>Nani grits her teeth. “Out with it, jerk.”</p><p>“We’re concerned, is all,” Awang offers finally.</p><p>“On where my loyalties lie?” Nani shoots.</p><p>Awang tilts his head. “No. Where hers does.”</p><p>
  <strong>(99)</strong>
</p><p>Cantika should’ve kept Nani out of this one, but neither of them could’ve known that this was what tonight would bring them, and things are just going way too good for Cantika that she forgets they’re on opposing sides, when it comes to things like this.</p><p>“Stop,” Nani says, almost pleads, and it’s insane how Cantika has a goddess begging for her not to kill when Nani could easily make Cantika do that. Cantika isn’t sure what’s stopping her from pulling the trigger. In the past, she wouldn’t have hesitated. When it comes to human traffickers—<em>child </em>traffickers—Cantika shows no mercy. Perhaps it’s some sick sense of wanting to hear more of that begging or some betrayal of her own mind who wants to listen to Nani.</p><p>“You promised,” Nani presses, desperate.</p><p>“You should know better than to trust a killer to keep a promise,” Cantika says.</p><p>The hurt in Nani’s eyes doesn’t escape her. Her hand is still on the trigger anyway. “Cantika,” and her voice is booming, like that will scare Cantika, “you drop that fucking gun or I <em>swear</em> last night would be the last of—whatever this was happening between us.”</p><p>It hits like a sucker-punch, all the implications behind it. The hurt spreads all across her body and in one instant, she’s made the decision.</p><p>The shot rings in the night, echoing off the walls, and as blood splatters on the concrete, Cantika takes off into the dark, where she’s always belonged.</p><p>
  <strong>(3)</strong>
</p><p>This is how their first kiss went:</p><p>A clash of teeth, violent. Rough hands, rougher mouth. Cold cement, fingers fluttering over an erratic pulse, closing around it. Breathless. A long time coming.</p><p>“We’re fucked, aren’t we,” Nani says after it’s done, shaking and aching and wanting. God, the want is <em>massive</em>, taking over her.</p><p>Cantika squeezes her waist. “Not yet.”</p><p>
  <strong>(19)</strong>
</p><p>One of their many violent kisses:</p><p>“What’s gotten into you?” Cantika asks between kisses. She’s in a long dress made of silk. The back is completely open. Nani wants to rip it off. “Earlier wasn’t enough?”</p><p>Nani growls into her mouth. “Shut the fuck up and kiss me.”</p><p>Cantika doesn’t, because she doesn’t let anyone boss her around. She fits her hands on Nani’s shoulders and push until she’s kneeling. There is no place to look but up, into the darkened eyes of the woman who holds a strange, terrifying power over her. Nani greedily soaks up her attention.</p><p>“You don’t get to tell me what to do,” Cantika says.</p><p>“I’m a goddess,” Nani says.</p><p>“I don’t really care,” Cantika says, and pulls Nani into the wet heat between her legs, and trapped like this, lapping up everything Cantika has to give, it feels clear where Cantika’s loyalties lie.</p><p>
  <strong>(87)</strong>
</p><p>“She’s not hurting me,” Nani says. “She’s <em>not </em>hurting me.”</p><p>“She strings you along,” Wulan says.</p><p>“No, I’m—I’m following her,” Nani says. “She didn’t <em>make </em>me. I did it all on my own volition.”</p><p>“You told me that it feels like she moves the finish line every time you go forward,” Wulan says. “That’s not love, Nan. That’s infatuation.”</p><p>
  <strong>(68)</strong>
</p><p>Nani should learn to admit that she is bad at some things, but until the day she dies, she will never let Cantika know that she almost burned down the house trying to cook a steak dinner for two. As much as she’s trying to conceal the disaster, the smell of smoke still lingers, and of course when Cantika gets home, she knows immediately what has happened.</p><p>She’s not even mad, just finds everything really hilarious. She peeks at the trashcan, where Nani has hidden the evidence of burned steak considerably not very smartly, and bursts into a peal of laughter. Quite the opposite, Nani is not entertained.</p><p>“Look, I was just trying to do something nice,” Nani says defensively.</p><p>“But instead you <em>cooked</em>?” Cantika teases. At Nani’s downturned mouth, she relents, pulling Nani into a loose embrace. “Sorry, sorry. I was just playing with you.”</p><p>“I just wanted to have a romantic evening,” Nani mumbles against her chest.</p><p>“Oh, so we’re on the stage where we <em>plan</em> romantic evenings now?” Cantika is laughing, but there’s an edge of nervousness in her voice.</p><p>“If you want,” Nani says. “I mean, we did say I love you to each other.”</p><p>“We did, didn’t we,” Cantika hums.</p><p>
  <strong>(102)</strong>
</p><p>It's nighttime, but the city refuses to fall asleep. No, the city wakes up once the moon rises on the horizon. A different face, one that's much dirtier than the polluted air of the hustle and bustle of the uncaring capital city, crueler than the sun beating down on the backs of Ojek riders. Cantika looks down, a good fifty-meters below her, where the city expands into a glittering, deceptive night life, the only time she'll be able to catch her target.</p><p><em>The only romantic thing about the city is the notion that it can be saved</em>, she muses. Jakarta doesn't boast its romance like Paris, but it's filthy all the same. The ground is sinking, and the people keep partying over it, just fine pretending that they are not deeply disturbed by the unrelenting pace of the city, the demands it wrenches from them.</p><p>Her clothes feel foreign, untrue. But she's not Bapak's little obedient orphan anymore; the green of the nursing ward, the heavy, gathered skirt—she no longer fits in that role. She doesn't know who she is now—who Cantika is without Bapak's mission—but she does know one thing: when there's a predator, she's going to make them prey.</p><p>She brings the binoculars to her eyes, halfway to boredom—stake-outs aren't as fun when she's alone, but she squashes down the longing for her siblings' presence as deep as she can. The Orphans are done. She's her own person now. It's nearly half an hour before she catches something of interest—a truck is pulling up into the driveway of The 101, Akhsara's latest delivery. There it is.</p><p>She leaps into action. She thanks Bapak's relentless training that lets her do impossible stunts like this, jumping off a building into the roof of a moving truck, crawling to the shotgun seat like gravity won't do a thing to her. She sticks her head underneath, so the driver could see her through the windshield and scream, reach for a gun—but not faster than her. One hit shatters the glass, and she vaults herself inside, using her own gun to blow the driver's brain all over the steering wheel. He's alone, which is a stupid, rookie mistake—or Akhsara is just getting cockier.</p><p>There's a box of tissues on the dashboard. She cleans her face, her hands—if her informant is right and the truck is loaded full of trafficked girls, the last thing she wants is for them to be scared of her. A bloody face wouldn't help her cause.</p><p>She steers the truck into The 101 with perfect calm. Security stops her when she approaches, but they don’t bother looking inside. They’ve been instructed not to. Cantika gives them a smile anyway.</p><p>Akhsara has a designated parking spot, one lone, isolated garage with three layers of locks and a heap of security, who all move out of the way when they catch sight of her taillights. If they find it strange to see a woman behind the wheel, they don’t show it. Cantika wonders if she should memorize the faces of the men who would soon be breathing their last.</p><p>Putting her gun back in the holster, she parks the truck, and jumps out.</p><p>The heavy garage doors shut behind her.</p><p>If this was a regular drop, she’d have to leave through a discreet exit obscured by a steel rack. She’d need to verify her fingerprints. It’s a large bottleneck in her plan that she’s ashamed to admit she hasn’t solved, but she’ll find a way. Growing up an orphan means getting scrappy, a scavenger-like sort of mindset, because she’s used to making things work for herself—garbage diving, finding the nearest blunt object to bludgeon a man’s head with.</p><p>She’ll find her way.</p><p>And with luck, she won’t even need Nani’s help.</p><p>
  <strong>(53)</strong>
</p><p>The slide of skin on skin is electric, and Nani feels drunk, heady with it. Her mind whites-out, the only sensations narrowed down this: her on her back, hands pinned to the floor like she couldn’t just break out of Cantika’s grip if she wanted to, Cantika’s fingers inside of her, giving her everything she’s never been able to give herself. Like everything she does, Cantika’s relentless with her, only encouraged by the trembling of her hips, her legs.</p><p>“Please—” her words cut off, a sensation like she’s never had shooting up her spine. Cantika smirks like she’s found what she’s been looking for all her life.</p><p>“Please what?” she asks, smug, like she knows there’s no way Nani can complete that sentence. She leans down, whispers it against her jaw, “Please what, baby?”</p><p>And of course that’s what gets her undone. She can’t hold her moans, not if she wants to—sounds spill out of her mouth without her realizing it was hers, halfway screams and Cantika’s name. Her body arches off the floor, her legs trying to close, but Cantika won’t let it, keeping them apart with her own, watching her with a sort of awe that has her heart feeling heavy.</p><p>Cantika caresses the side of her face, and she doesn’t care if her own wetness is smeared across her nose, Cantika’s peppering her forehead with kisses, small pecks like she just couldn’t help it. She captures Nani’s gasping mouth in hers, and Nani melts into it like she isn’t out of breath herself, kissing back with just as much fervor.</p><p>Nani feels feverish, overwhelmed in the best possible way. Nothing sits on her shoulders now, no burden of being the savior of a generation or a goddess incarnate or the leader of a superpowered semi-vigilante group. She just exists, a girl alongside a girl, in a world that is not her responsibility.</p><p>It’s her only excuse for saying, <em>I love you</em>.</p><p>Cantika’s fully sober, awake and alert, fully aware of what’s happening. It’s why she doesn’t have an excuse for saying, <em>I love you too.</em></p><p>
  <strong>(71)</strong>
</p><p>“Is her pussy made of cocaine?”</p><p>Nani chokes, because <em>what the fuck</em>. Susi stares her down, wolfing down Roti Boy like she just asked her how the weather was. She’s not fazed at all. Nani’s wide-eyed, offended and indignant, but mostly just really goddamn embarrassed.</p><p>“Like, there’s gotta be reason why you keep coming back.”</p><p>“Holy fucking hell, Susi.”</p><p>“The sex’s gotta be fucking mind-blowing, right? Ten orgasms a day? Twenty?” Susi goes on, balling up the wrapper in her hands and throwing it at the trash can next to Nani’s desk. It doesn’t land. She doesn’t move to pick it up. Nani’s this close to decking her across the head. She should set up sexual harassment conduct in Patriots, she thinks.</p><p>“Is that why you came to my office?” Nani demands.</p><p>“Among other things,” Susi grins. God, this is why she gets along with Awang so well. They’re both hell-bent on driving Nani to an early goddamn grave. She leans over Nani’s desk, hands braced on the mahogany table top, face just too close for comfort. “That’s gotta be the reason, right? ‘Cause you’re not happy.”</p><p>Nani’s breath catches.</p><p>“Like, not at all,” Susi says.</p><p>Very evenly, Nani looks up. She’s surprised to find Susi looking back with sadness.</p><p>“Get the fuck out my office,” Nani tells her.</p><p>Susi throws her hands up, uncaring. She passes the balled-up wrapper on the floor, and kicks it into the trash can. It lands just perfectly. She does a little dance. Nani wants to fucking commit murder.</p><p>“See ya later, crackhead.”</p><p>The door slams shut, and Nani wonders why it feels like the final nail on the coffin.</p><p>
  <strong>(105)</strong>
</p><p>Cantika knows she’s misjudged even before she opens her eyes.</p><p>Pain is the only thing that she feels for a while. But that’s not unfamiliar. She registers the shackles first, tight around her arms, which are over her head. Oh. So she’s hanging somewhere. She looks down. Her feet are free, at least. Whoever abducted her must be a complete fucking idiot. The cell rattles, and two men walk in, each holding a weapon—a spiked bat, a tonfa. Fun.</p><p>They take turn breaking her down into a pulp. Cantika almost laughs at their valiant efforts—really, if any of these people <em>know </em>anything about the Orphans, it’s that they’ve been tortured since birth. They will get <em>nothing </em>out of Cantika, no matter what the method is. Anything they tried on her, Pengkor had her brothers and sisters done to her.</p><p>“Who sent you?”</p><p>Myself, that’s who.</p><p>“Who are you working for?”</p><p>No one but myself.</p><p>She forgives herself when she passes out. She ought to be kinder to herself—she’s missing all her toe nails, after all.</p><p>Her father always said that pain wakes one’s soul up. But this time, it’s the lack of it that jolts her awake.</p><p>Mutiara Jenar clicks her tongue at her, as if she’s looking at a particular fashion choice that she doesn’t agree with. One of her legs is metal, a reminder of just what Pengkor had cost them, but she stands tall on her feet, still as proud as the day she was seventeen and telling every industry exec she would not be whitewashed in a magazine cover.</p><p>“Sloppy,” is all she offers as she cuts Cantika’s shackles free. Cantika takes a moment to consider the bloodbath on the cement floor before falling into her embrace. Jenar smells like Chanel No. 5, as she always does. Cantika wonders how she could afford it—after all, no one in the modeling world wanted to hire a model with a metal leg, no matter how exotic.</p><p>“I thought you skipped town,” Cantika says.</p><p>“I did,” Jenar sounds annoyed, like saving her sister from a certain death has the same capability to ruin her day as much as a barista fucking up her order at Starbucks does. “Then your girlfriend called.”</p><p>
  <strong>(40)</strong>
</p><p>The shell of Nani’s ear is apparently Cantika’s new area of obsession.</p><p>This is the first morning they spent waking up next to each other. This is the first morning where, instead of undoing each other, Cantika’s watching her create Nani Wijaya of the day. She does it with a honey kind of sweetness curling on the edge of her mouth, with the sheets bunched up around her chest. Nani doesn’t see the point in decency when she’s stuck her mouth to her nipples and sucked, last night.</p><p>As she’s putting on her jewelry, Cantika finally gets off the bed and comes up behind her. She mouths along the cartilage of her ear.</p><p>Nani giggles, because she’s never been happier.</p><p>“What does this do?” Cantika asks as she fits the <em>sumping </em>on her ears.</p><p>“Alerts me when danger is coming,” Nani says. “Also gives me a steady stream of all the injustices happening in this city, so all it does is give me a headache.”</p><p>“Danger?”</p><p>“Yeah,” Nani says. She grins up at Cantika. “Like you.”</p><p>
  <strong>(99)</strong>
</p><p>“You can’t keep distracting me from arguments with sex, you know,” Nani says.</p><p>“You love it,” Cantika says.</p><p>“Yeah,” Nani gasps as Cantika closes her mouth around her. “I do, I love it so much—<em>ah</em>—fuck—”</p><p>
  <strong>(28)</strong>
</p><p>“I didn’t set out to—<em>date </em>a fucking killer!”</p><p>“Date? Oh, how sweet. You think just because I fuck you well you’re my girlfriend?”</p><p>“What the fuck, why is that the only thing that you hear when I’m trying to tell you that it’s <em>wrong</em> to kill people—”</p><p>“Did you have this many ministrations when you killed my father?”</p><p>“Fuck off, you wanted your father killed as much as I do.”</p><p>“You know nothing about what I want.”</p><p>
  <strong>(49)</strong>
</p><p>“Sancaka.”</p><p>Gundala glances at her. Out of everyone in the team, she’s the one Nani can’t figure out. They have a sort of truce going on after their initial hostility. But unlike Awang, who pushes and shoves but gives in, or Wulan, who rolls her eyes and calls Nani out on her bullshit but welcomes her into her arms, or Tira who just simply doesn’t give a fuck, Sancaka remains guarded around her.</p><p>Maybe it’s why Sancaka’s the best person to answer her question.</p><p>“How do you know you love Wulan?”</p><p>Gundala doesn’t falter. But Nani imagines Sancaka does, going as red as his suit inside. “You really think a stakeout is the best place to discuss love?”</p><p>“I just want to know.”</p><p>“Why don’t you ask Wulan?”</p><p>Nani’s silent.</p><p>A beat, and then, “Oh. You don’t want her to know.”</p><p>“She’ll fucking kill me if I fall in love,” Nani says.</p><p>“Then why did you?”</p><p>“I don’t know,” Nani admits. “I thought I could save her.”</p><p>
  <strong>(159)</strong>
</p><p>Another violent kiss:</p><p>“You didn’t call,” Nani hisses.</p><p>“You told me it’s over,” Cantika bites. Nani shudders, closing her eyes. Cantika twists her fingers and her eyes fly open. It’s a most beautiful sight. “You sent Jenar after me.”</p><p>“I can’t stop caring about you,” Nani confesses.</p><p>Into the night, they melt.</p>
<hr/><p>
  <strong>(1)</strong>
</p><p>“I can’t save you,” Nani says, “just as much as you can’t save me.”</p><p>“You don’t need to be saved,” Cantika tells her. No, in fact—she’ll never tell Nani this, but every time she looks at the other girl, she sees a halo. The power of a goddess, with all the kindness in the world. It’s almost unreal—no wonder she runs away from it. Things that are too good scare her, and yet—</p><p>She lets Nani pull her bodily, their foreheads colliding, their lips crashing like waves. Nani kisses her so deeply, she feels it all over her body. Cantika doesn’t bother concealing her shivers.</p><p>“No,” Nani shakes her head, lips shiny, and fuck if that isn’t the most stunning thing Cantika has ever seen. She touches Nani’s cheeks, soft and unblemished, and wonders how, after everything’s that happened, she still lets her this close. Nani breathes against her lips, “Not from you.”</p><p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>if you ask me, what the hell is this, nadh? i wouldn't know either. i just want to write a toxic/dysfunctional relationship dynamic and i love to befall pain upon my child, nani wijaya. why is so crude? i don't know. maybe because i need to feel alive in this trying time. did i start writing this months ago and let it gather dust, only to finish it fervently in the span of 4 hours? also yes.</p><p>i also listened to an insane amount of halsey's graveyard while writing this, so it's kind of loosely inspired by it, although the vibe in this fic is completely different. </p><p>please tell me what you think. or yell at me about how bad it is. i am on twitter @tinypoffertjes</p></blockquote></div></div>
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